New Love: Eau Thermale Avene Cleanser & Cream

My skincare routine is very simple nowadays; just wash, tone, put some eye cream and moisturize. I don’t know if it’s because of pregnancy that made me skip a few steps (I’m lazier), but I definitely need less products than I used to. I don’t use serum or oil anymore, and I never do a facial or use face mask like before.

Since my pregnant hormones stabilized (I guess I could say that), my skin has changed from very dry (earlier in pregnancy I suffered from really dry skin condition) to almost normal. I think my skin is normal-sensitive now. It has the right amount of oil – no excess oil on my T-zones, I don’t break out (neither on face nor body) even when I only wash my face once a day, and without the use of serum or oil, my skin is never dry. It’s the best skin condition I’ve ever had in my life.

I’ve been loving two products recently; Eau Thermale Avene Gentle Gel Cleanser and the Light Hydrating Serum. I just switched to these two – the gel cleanser I have used for over a month and the cream for only a week – but what a wonder they do to my skin! I will review the products one by one, starting with the cleanser.

1. Eau Thermale Avene Gentle Gel Cleanser

Forgive my pregnant brain, but I don’t know how much this was priced because I bought it over a month ago. I think it was around RM 79.00? Around that price range la. Bought it at Guardian. This has 200 ml of products and this could last me a very long time, maybe over 6 months. But I use this often and quite generously so I will be surprised if I ever reach 6 months! This cleanser has a sturdy plastic bottle that feels almost like glass, with a pump so it is very hygienic. The only thing that I didn’t like about the packaging is that it didn’t come with a cap, so it’s not travel-friendly.

It has gel texture so it doesn’t foam up very easily. Use it correctly, it will clean your face without stripping off the excess oil so it won’t dry out your skin. How I use it: first, I’ll wet my face, then pump a decent amount of product on my fingers, put a little on my forehead and evenly distributed the rest on my cheeks, chin and nose, gently massage the skin for 30 seconds and rinse it off. After cleansing, my skin doesn’t feel as tight as other products did to me. It still feel a bit moisturized.

Another thing I love is the scent. It has a gentle, pleasant scent that is calming to me. My nose is very sensitive nowadays, and normally I would avoid any products that smells, but I give an exception to this cleanser.

Avene Gentle Gel Cleanser is specifically for normal to combination sensitive skin.

2. Eau Thermale Avene Light Hydrating Cream

This product is to replace my Kiehl’s Ultra Facial Cream that I had long loved. The reason is simple: there is no Kiehl’s store in Kuantan, thus it is hard to replace a product once I’m out of it, and I have fallen in love with Avene.

I bought this moisturizer once I’m sure that I really like Avene and ready to use moisturizer other than Kiehl’s. I bought Avene Light Hydrating Cream in Sasa. It was originally RM 89.00 but I got 10% off so I only paid RM 80.10. It has 40ml amount of product, so since I use it day and night, I don’t think it will last me very long.

This moisturizer comes in a tube so it is hygienic, has a pleasant signature Avene scent, has a very light texture and spreads easily on the face. Although it is light, it is very hydrating. It is more hydrating than Kiehl’s I must say.

I found that this product doesn’t produce excess oil on my face. I only use it for a week but I already notice a huge difference on my skin! My skin is more soft and supple, more hydrated, my blackheads and whiteheads have significantly reduced and I don’t have a single zit on my face. I have great love for this product.

Avene Light Hydrating Cream comes in two version; one with SPF and one without. Mine is the one without SPF because I overlooked the detail. I only realized that it has SPF version once I reached home. I was bummed for a moment because isn’t it good to have a moisturizer with SPF so that I won’t have to use sunscreen anymore? But then I thought I will use up this moisturizer so fast that will be able to buy the one with SPF next time.

Avene Light Hydrating Cream is specifically for normal to combination sensitive skin.

Bonus: I still use Kiehl’s Cucumber Toner (which I really love but I might change it to Avene once I finish it) and my eye cream is from Shaklee.

Disappointing Products #1

1. Kiehl’s Lip Balm

If you know me, you must be wondering how on Earth a Kiehl’s product managed to get into this list, right? As an avid fan of Kiehl’s, it breaks my heart to do this, but I’m always honest with my review even if it means giving it a bad name. So why does this product disappoint me? It is not the product’s fault actually, it is ME who had high expectation on it from the start.

Let’s see, Kiehl’s Lip Balm claims to provide SPF 4 // Sunscreen // Petrolatum // Skin Protectant. I guess I missed the word  “Petrolatum” while reading the label briefly because I was buying it in a rush. I used to use Vaseline as a lip balm in the past but I stopped using it because it was made out of petroleum jelly. I don’t remember why, but I knew that I didn’t want to put any petroleum-based product on my lips anymore since I started having allergies from certain products. Although I was not allergic to Vaseline, I stopped anyway.

Having used to flavoured/sweet lip balm (i.e NYC Lip Sliders Tinted Lip Balm) ever since, I admit I expected Kiehl’s Lip Balm to taste the same. It was not. It tasted exactly like Vaseline. The texture of it, the scent, the finish, the way it moisturise, it was all the same. There is no need for you to buy Kiehl’s Lip Balm for RM 35.00, which comes with only 17 g of product, when you can have one like it cheaper with twice or thrice the amount of product just from a small tub of Vaseline.

2. Heavy Rotation Maxi Long Mascara

This is one of the reasons why I rarely wear mascara nowadays. I had forgotten the price since I bought this so long ago, but I think it was between RM 45.00 – RM 50.00 at Sasa. Worst RM 50.00 I’ve ever spent. Why? Because this mascara didn’t do ANYTHING!

It claims to lengthen eyelashes but seriously, after two, three coats of application, my eyelashes still looked the same. No lengthening, no curling, no volume. There is no need to do a before and after picture because there isn’t any difference. USELESS MASCARA EVER.

Don’t buy.

3. Tony Moly Cats Wink Mascara

This mascara was a little bit better than the Heavy Rotation. It volumized and lengthened as it claims on the tube. The only problem I had with it was it didn’t hold out the curl. My eyelashes looked fantastic on the first coat, thick and black, but when I applied second coat, BAM! my eyelashes drooped down like they cannot withstand the weight. The formula was too heavy for my eyelashes. I cannot make do with ONE coat of mascara, I need more!

This mascara can only be bought at Tony Moly stores. Once again, I’d forgotten the price but I think it was between RM 35.00 – RM 45.00. I don’t recommend it though because there are better mascaras with cheaper price (i.e. Maybelline The Falsies). The packaging was cute, though.

4. Brow Lash Water Strong Pencil Liner

This eyeliner was the first eyeliner I bought as a substitute for my all-time favourite pencil eyeliner, Silky Girl Long Wearing Eyeliner. The reason I was looking for a substitute was because I wanted a more long-lasting eyeliner with creamy texture, something like Milani eyeliner but we don’t have it here. Long story short, I found this eyeliner before I found my beloved Urban Decay, and was impressed with the tester I tried. It was creamy, it glided on smoothly and not easily budge even when I rubbed it hard. I was sold on the spot.

However, the one that I brought home with me was not the same as the tester at all. It was not creamy and really hard to line my eyes with. The product did not transfer easily on my lash line, making the drawing painful. I'd tried to rub it on the back on my hand first to warm it up but it still remained the same. Not only it wasn’t creamy, it was also brittle. When I drew too hard, it broke. WORST EYELINER EVER.

I bought it at Watsons Pavilion with the price range RM 60.00 – RM 70.00. Not worth it, girls. Don’t buy.

I Have Food On My Face!

Honey Turmeric Mask (HTM) is probably the most raved mask in my street right now. I saw my colleague have been posting about this mask in FB for a few weeks already but I didn’t feel like trying at the time. Then my housemate came home bringing HTM and been wearing it during her free time but I was still not interested to try. Until one day I was left alone at home with nothing to do. I saw HTM in our kitchen (my housemate kept it in the kitchen cupboard), saw a bottle of honey and I was texting her in an instant asking permission to use her mask. She said yes.

I mixed the HTM with honey until it becomes a paste, washed my face with cleanser, applied the paste and let it on for 30 minutes. The mask sat comfortably on my face; my face didn’t feel hot or anything and the mask didn’t drip onto my clothes. When the 30 minutes was off, the mask was slightly dry on skin but it was easy to wash off. When in contact with water (I just use water from the tap) the mask broke off in chunks and because HTM had a slightly gritty texture, it exfoliated my face as I was cleaning it off.

HTM had a very strong herbal scent and even mixed with honey, I could still smell it. It bugged me a bit but I was satisfied with the result. My face felt smooth, clean and moist afterwards. HTM didn’t stain my face just like common turmeric so that was good.

I was sold and I bought the mask a couple of days later. According to my read, turmeric has been used as a beauty treatment for hundreds of years – I didn’t know that. Turmeric has antiseptic, antibacterial and anti-inflammatory properties. As for honey, honey gently cleanses and moisturises the skin, reducing swelling and inflammation and also has antibacterial properties. Used together, honey turmeric mask is especially effective for acne and dry skin.

Seeing my simple HTM recipe was successful, I started to add more ingredients in the mask to maximize the result. I added yogurt and ESP. With these combination of yogurt, ESP, HTM and honey, I found that the mask dried really fast, like in 10 minutes (ratio yogurt to honey was 2:1 so maybe that’s the factor).

ESP + HTM + Yogurt

Plus

A few drops of honey

1) HTM + Honey; 2) HTM + ESP + Honey + Yogurt

Although the result was good, I found that yogurt slightly irritated my skin. The skin around my mouth tightened and cracked so I knew that I was allergic with yogurt, not the other ingredients. I just knew.

So next I just mixed ESP, HTM and honey to make the mask. Doing it for the second time, I found that ESP was able to mask the strong herbal scent of HTM so I was not disturbed by it anymore. Yay! However, the scent came out strongly during washing. But it was a natural scent so it wouldn’t affect anything.

I strongly recommend you to try this all-natural mask!

1 tub of HTM contains 200 g of product; comes with a free bottle of honey

I bought mine from Aimi (01126886562)

My ESP Drink Recipe

There are so many ways to drink ESP but my personal favourite is to mix it with juice. You can use whatever juice available in the store i.e. Tropicana Twister, VeGood, Marigold Peel Fresh, etc, and you can use whatever flavour that suits your desire. I personally like to mix ESP with a quite sour juice because ESP will make it sweet. Not that ESP is highly sweet, but I found that mixing already sweet juice will make it sweeter so I don’t fancy that.

I use a 300 ml water bottle because I only make a serving for me. I found this cheap water bottle at Kedai 2.00 for only a few bucks. But this bottle is good because the cap is really tight so it will not leak if you shake it hard. Plus, it has measurement on the side so it always come in handy.

So, my recipe is:

Put 2 tbs of ESP inside the water bottle

Pour about 250-300 ml of juice of your choice

Shake well

Once it’s done, you will get this frothy goodness that  tastes really delicious. It’s like having a soda in juice form.

CHEERS!!! It is better served cold.

Introducing…Shaklee ESP

I have been consuming ESP for more than 3 weeks now and I’m delighted to say that I’m very happy with what it does to my skin!

For your information, our new facial cells grow every 21 days. As we age, the number of new cells decrease, making our skin sag and lost its elasticity. Just imagine a wall without enough bricks, a few holes here and there, surely it is not a very sturdy wall, is it? It’s breakable, it lets dirt going into our house and it’s not very nice to see, right?

Our skin is like that wall, our cells are like those bricks and what glues them together, the cement, is the collagen (but I’ll get into this in the future).

What builds our cells? The answer is simple: it is Protein. That’s our cell’s food and to produce healthy cells, we must eat enough protein. There are 20 types of proteins and our body is able to build 11 out of 20. But the other 9, we must take it separately. The common sources of protein are eggs, fishes, chickens, cheese, yogurt, soy, just to name a few.

When I first consume ESP, I don’t even know what I talked about just now because I consume it for a whole different reason (which I will tell, also, later in the future). Having a good, clear, glowing skin as a side result is just a bonus, and who doesn’t like bonus? I welcome it with open arms *smile*. Anyway, I got all the information from a sharing I attended last Saturday, led by Master Norita, an accomplished Shaklee user and businesswoman and her husband (sorry kak forgot his name! *shame on me*). Since I was new, I only able to digest the first half of the sharing, which was the science of it – and I’m always good in Biology anyway.

Anywhoooo…(I keep getting out of track here) ESP, yes, ESP is one of the best sources of protein that is essential for our body (ahem, cells). What does ESP stands for? ESP is Energizing Soy Protein. Yes, based on its name, it is made out of soy. ESP provides 14 grams of non-GMO soy protein with all the amino acids, including the nine essential amino acids our body needs for protein synthesis.

Okay, so what it does to my skin?

Since our new facial cells grow every 21 days, the clear result only could be seen after 21 days. However, I noticed a difference even after the first week of consuming ESP. I noticed that my face has become tighter and brighter. Bumps (not acne, just uneven skin) and redness around my nose and on my cheeks lessened. Skin began to feel moist and elastic. My blackheads and whiteheads have been reduced. Entering the third week, it’s only a week left until Aunt Flow (AF) comes, that is to say, I’m in my PMS week, I noticed that I HAVE NOT HAD a single blemish on my face, and even on my back. How AHMAZING is that.

I admit that aside from ESP, I also take a few other Shaklee products that might be contributing the goodness of my skin, but I solely believe that ESP is the main reason that made my skin the way it is today.

 

Skin after work. Had taken off BB cream. Haven’t had a bath yet (that explains the shine!).

And this is how ESP looks like:

It is 850 grams per canister. It is HUGEEE. Max 3 tbs a day, it can last more than a month, perhaps two, so it is very affordable. I consume ESP along with my housemate and I still have enough to last me two weeks.

Don’t hesitate to contact me if you are interested. I don’t bite. Hehe.